The neuronal mechanisms of conscious and unconscious decision-making

2022 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 20K06921
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Review Section: Basic Section 46030:Function of nervous system-related
• Research Institution: University of Tsukuba
• Principal Investigator: Kunimatsu Jun 筑波大学, 医学医療系, 助教 (50632395)
• Project Period (FY): 2020-04-01 – 2023-03-31
• Keywords: 社会性 / 価値 / 線条体 / 大脳基底核 / 眼球運動 / 霊長類

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Although we can quickly locate a familiar person even in a crowd, the underlying neuronal mechanism remains unclear. Recently, we found that the striatum tail (STRt), which is part of the basal ganglia, is sensitive to long-term reward history. Here, we show that long-term value-coding neurons are involved in the detection of socially familiar faces. Many STRt neurons respond to facial images, especially to those of socially familiar persons. Additionally, we found that these face-responsive neurons also encode the stable values of many objects based on long-term reward experiences. Interestingly, the strength of neuronal modulation of social familiarity bias (familiar or unfamiliar) and object value bias (high-valued or low-valued) were positively correlated. These results suggest that both social familiarity and stable object-value information are mediated by a common neuronal mechanism. This mechanism may contribute to the rapid detection of familiar faces in real-world contexts.

Free Research Field

システム神経生理学

Academic Significance and Societal Importance of the Research Achievements

本研究により、線条体尾部を介する大脳基底核の尾側経路が社会的な文脈においても長期的な価値を表現していることが示唆された。代表的な基底核疾患であるパーキンソン病やハンチントン病において、親しい人の顔の同定が困難となる障害が報告されており、本研究で示された神経メカニズムによってこの病態が説明できる可能性がある。このように、本研究は顔認知の情報処理を明らかにし、疾患時の病態生理の理解を促進する。